Stay Strong
by Willowfur and Piper
Summary: Rick spent so much time running, now he had nothing left to hide.


Rick supposed he could feel lucky.

He was home. Had a good team. A good job.

He was alive. And that had to count for something.

He absentmindedly stirred his drink, which he had mixed himself.

Fuck it if his bartending days were over, he had the skills. May as well use them.

Besides, waking up this morning sucked, he didn't look at the calendar all day but knew the date. And this day warranted drinking. He did this every year, so why should it change now that he has a pretty good job and 3 other people he could consider his friends. Sort of.

He drank another drink and ran his head through his black hair.

He'd called in sick today, not even caring that he didn't remotely sound sick.

Looking at the clock on the wall, he noticed the time, 3:30 pm.

"Not even drunk yet," he mused to himself. "An improvement for me."

He wished he had some sort of mission. Or a task. Anything that could take his mind off the pain of the day.

October 14th.

He was so lost in the mini whirlpool that he had created in his drink that he didn't even notice his phone start to vibrate next to him, signaling that he had a message.

If he had bothered to look at it, he would have known it was Michael.

Like it mattered. Another 40 minutes later, it went off again, snapping Rick out of his personal world.

Billy.

He sighed and looked at the phone's massage, after quickly checking the one from Michael.

Billy of course, wanted to know if he was interested in joining them at the pub. Like he wasn't drinking already.

But they didn't know that.

Of course they knew he wasn't really sick. Rick wasn't trying to make it a secret. Not that he could keep a secret from them anyways. It was more effort than he really wanted to put in.

Neither the less, he answered that he wasn't interested and promptly went back to his drinking.

A few more hours passed. Rick couldn't say he was drunk. He couldn't necessarily say he was sober either.

_How long could this day go on?_

Bright colored leaves fell outside, some landed in his window and the water stuck.

Such a bright season.

Such a gloomy day.

It was a bright day all those years ago too.

It was a bright day when she left for good.

_Don't think about it. _He scolded himself.

He finished his drink before stumbling into the kitchen for another bottle of vodka, stepping of shards of glass from what was once a whiskey bottle.

Not that he cared.

_I deserve it, after what I did._

He didn't even wince at the pain. He wasn't sure if he could feel it.

He wanted to feel the pain. All of it. It was the least he could do…

After walking through the shards with some vodka, he poured it into his glass and absentmindedly looked out at the bright colored leaves. His right hand ran along the scars on his right arm. Some there on purpose and some on accident.

He winced as he thought of how many he had placed there, in his depression.

No one could ever know. He could share many things with his team, but the scars of his past was not one of them.

Who knew what they would say.

He supposed he could call up one of his college buddies, they knew.

He grabbed his phone before placing it back on the table.

Best not to disturb them.

He was lost in his world again, not noticing the tears that formed in his eyes and dripped down his face.

_Be strong._

The words echoed in his head over and over again. He could hear the sounds of blood dripping, only not from his now sliced up feet.

No. This was from a different time.

He could place his mask up around people, pretend to be happy, tell them memories of happier days.

He could almost fool himself.

"_I won't be weak," _he said to himself. "_I'll keep moving forward, even if it hurts_."

He said those words in his head, not realizing when he said them out loud.

"That's the spirit," a voice behind him said, snapping him back to reality.

Rick turned to see Billy there, grinning like a maniac with a case of beer under his arm with Michael and Casey following the ever quick Billy into the house.

Michael looked at the drink in his hand and tsked. "I like to think that you'd know better than to skip work just to drink all day," he commented.

At this point, Rick couldn't bring himself to really care.

"Well, he probably has a reason, judging from how he looks," Billy commented.

Rick could only imagine what he looked like, wearing an old t shirt and sweats, his hair unkempt with blood running from his feet to the floor and tear treks on his face.

Nothing like the happy rookie that showed up for work every day.

"What do you guys want?" he sighed out, letting his shoulders hunch down again.

"To know why our little rookie was a no show today," Billy said cheerfully.

"None of your business," he half growled out.

Billy of course, ignored his obvious anger at him.

"Now, I'd say let's cure your small bout of depression with alcohol, but it seems like you already got that covered," Billy yapped on.

Casey headed towards the kitchen, looking through Rick's alcoholic beverages. He imagined the mess he had made earlier. The floor would be sticky and he was sure that those glass shards he still laying there. Some bottles were probably lying sideways on the counter, any content from them all over the kitchen.

"You should probably clean those glass shards up," Casey commented.

Rick, having long since been fed up with them just waltzing into his house and bugging him, snarled at Casey before stumbling up and going to the glass before going to his knees and attempting to pick up the glass pieces from the floor.

He didn't think of the stabbing pain in his hands or the glass that had sliced his knees up.

Billy looked at him in shock, Casey narrowed his eyes and Michael went to haul Rick off the floor.

Michael grabbed Rick's arm and hauled him up, the broken glass in his hands feel back onto the floor, some breaking into smaller pieces.

"What are you doing?" he snapped at Rick once he had gotten him onto the couch.

"I was cleaning up the glass," Rick said darkly.

"I didn't mean to pick it up piece by piece," Casey called, still in the kitchen. "You'll do nothing but hurt yourself doing that."

"Why do you guys care?"

Billy, having walked over to where Rick and Michael were, looked at Rick with a slightly confused face before bringing his hand up and slapping Rick.

Casey raised an eyebrow and Michael looked disapproving.

Rick grabbed his cheek and looked at Billy.

"That it?"

"Depends," Billy said, taking up his usual cheerful ways. "You going to continue to act like this?"

"I think," Michael intervened. "What Billy is trying to say is what's wrong."

"Nothing that matters to you," Rick countered.

"I think it does mate," Billy said. "I mean, you skipped work, so it's obviously not "nothing"."

"Past is the past," Rick said. "Just leave it at that."

"Come on," Billy said after leaving and coming back with a beer from his pack. "You can tell us."

"My sister," Rick finally said.

"What about her?" Billy prodded. "She hurt or something?"

By now, Casey had joined them in the living room and Michael had sat down next to Rick on the couch.

Rick barley noticed.

"No," Rick said sadly. "She's dead. Been dead for years, actually. As of today, 13 years."

"Oh," Billy said. "Sad."

"I was driving the car. Dad had died a year before and mom had gone into a depression. Back then, her neglect was only at a beginning stage. She still fed us. Kept her job. Paid mortgage and everything. Serah wanted a ride to school because of some issues she was having with a girl on the bus. She was barely 14, just beginning 9th grade. I'd gotten my license a few months earlier, having just turned 16 in December.

Anyways, on the way to school, the seniors from the school were driving, still drunk from some party the night before. They weren't watching where they were going, and when I tried to avoid a collision, but instead of me going through the windshield like it should have been at the angle the other car was coming at us, Serah went through the window instead. The seatbelt hadn't been able to withstand the jerk.

After that, mom fell into an even deeper depression. She never beat me but she did blame me. And she told the rest of the family that it was my fault that Serah died. They believed her. Mom just went crazy. I don't blame my mother for hating me, it was my fault. She tried to charge me with manslaughter though. It never went though because of the other guy being drunk while driving.

The bottom line is, on this day, 13 years ago, I killed my little sister."

Rick looked down.

"That's," Billy said. "Wow."

Casey stayed silent.

Michael looked at Rick. He tried to keep the pity out of his eyes.

"It just went downhill from there. Mom ignored me, sometime refused to feed me. I feel into a chronic depression." He looked at the vertical scars on his forearms. "Went to cutting. Never saw a doctor until my friend, Faith, found me dying at my house. Mom was out with one of her guy friends. She brought me to the hospital. They put me on a suicide watch."

Rick looked thoughtfully out the window. "Looking back on it, she probably saved my life. On more than one occasion. She's the only one who never blamed me."

The room fell silent.

Billy had started crying, Michael noticed. Unlike him, although, after hearing that story, most people would be reduced to sobs.

He also noticed Rick's face. Sad, but not crying. Billy hugged him. Michael patted him on the back.

"It's fine," he said. "It's all over now. We have your back."

Rick looked from one team member to the next.

They didn't blame him.

Maybe that fateful day 13 years ago hadn't been his fault. Maybe it had been.

He'd been struggling with this alone for all these years, trying to put a mask up to hide everything.

Now, he could get past this, with the help of the 3 other men in the room who could possibly be the only people left on this planet who could understand him.

He would be strong.

"I've spent so much time trying to fool everyone else," Rick said. "That I fooled myself in the process."

Michael sent him a sad smile.

Serah's last words rung strong in his head.

_Stay strong._

And with those words uttered out loud to everyone in the room, Rick fell on the floor, on his knees.

And sobbed 13 years worth of pain away.

* * *

**A/N: I feel like they're all out of character.**

**Whatever.**

**Review if you feel like it. I don't care.**

**And it's Un'betaed by the way. **


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